Nutrisystem’s Dietitian Provides Tips for Making Healthier Choices
Courtney McCormick, Corporate Dietitian, Nutrisystem
(Fort Washington, PA, Thursday, March 1, 2017) – Have you ever left the grocery store with way more than you went there for? The supermarket is trying to get you to buy – and eat – more. Some of their tricks include:
- That cart: According to Slate.com, the size of shopping carts have tripled since they were invented in 1938.
- The bad stuff is within easy reach: It’s placed on shelves that are easy to get to. Oddly enough, researchers have found, it was how much a shopper had to flex his or her arm—by reaching and bending—that deterred them from buying healthier food and drew them to the bad stuff.
- They hide the staples: Where are the milk, eggs, meat and fish? Usually, in the back of the store, which means you often have to travel through aisles of snacks and sodas to get to the real food.
March is National Nutrition Month, and there are some simple ways we can make healthier food decisions, such as shopping during the week and not on weekends, stepping away from the buffet, reading the label of everything we put in our carts, and buying frozen foods, which studies show there are many that are just as healthy now as fresh.
Some other tricks grocery stores use include:
- There’s nothing special about the end caps: When you see a stack of products at the end of an aisle, it’s natural to assume that they’re on “special,” when actually products on these “end caps” are usually there because the manufacturer paid extra to have them placed there.
- Crowded aisle: Ever wonder why markets stack boxes of items in already narrow aisles? Think, traffic jam, which may encourage you to scan the shelves until the way is clear—and grab something on impulse.